Shanghai Expo Redux

We're weeks away from the World Expo opening here in Shanghai. I've been living in Shanghai for over 4 months and what I find amazing is how quickly things get deconstructed gutted, remodeled and rebuilt so quickly!

Like the Olympics in Beijing, there have been many construction projects in preparation for the millions of expected international visitors. From the facades (I've seen front of buildings painted nicely, but when you go into the alley, you see it's only the front facade painted), to entirely new buildings and parks (like the Expo grounds), it's an amazing site to behold. But what I find the most fascinating are scenes like the picture to the above and left.

These are actual commercial sites that have many active customers and patrons. But then suddenly a few days later you'll see it gutted. It's not like there's only a few patrons, but hundreds of active patrons. Yet as you see in the picture above, many people still frequent these places while construction is going on. I literally had just eaten at that food court a few days earlier only to see this place gutted a few days later. This has happened to at least a few other places I used to eat at. The speed of change, construction and renovation happening in China is already mind blowing. Add international events like the Olympics and the World Expo to that change and I'm witnessing a very unique, strange and exponentially rapidly changing China everyday.

This unique time in history is a daily aspect life in China right now. It is just one of the many reasons I choose to live here at this time.

Magical But Unsustainable

I ordered my iPad (or as some call it, my "giant iPod") a few weeks ago and I'm told it's currently waiting for me in California. So while I'll be taking a journey overseas for business reasons, I'll be able to pick up this "magical" device (as Steve Jobs and company describe it) weeks before its international release. Not dissimilar to my experience with the iPhone, as an Apple fanatic, I'm salivating at the prospects of playing with this device. Nothing new there. End of story right? The difference is this time, I tracked my iPad's progress. As indicated in the screen cap below, my iPad's journey begins in Shenzen, China!


While I currently live in Shanghai China, I just happened to be in Shenzen last week on transit from Hong Kong back to Shanghai. So wouldn't it have been cool if I could just pick this device up at the factory where most Apple products are assembled in China? Yeah, I know commerce doesn't work that way. But it should.

Who am I to be getting on my high horse after ordering this device and going (indirectly) overseas to pick this up? I admit it. I'm guilty as are most of us for committing unsustainable practices. What the heck does "unsustainable practices" even mean? That's one of the things I'm trying to define. How? Why?

One, I've been reading "Confessions of a Radical Industrialist" by Ray C. Anderson on my Kindle. Mr. Anderson is at the forefront of creating truly sustainable companies. Two, I'm starting a new project which proposes to build a green and sustainable university campus in China. This is one of those "journey not destination" moments. But I believe it is an extremely important and worthy journey. I hope someday I will look back upon this blog entry about picking up my "magical" device in an unsustainable manner and laugh at how we used to practice unsustainable commerce back in the early 2000's.

If that future were to become real, then that would truly be magical!